HAVING banned all talk of the "Serena Slam" for the previous fortnight, Serena Williams was at last willing to discuss her feat when it became reality thanks to her 6-4, 6-4 victory over Garbine Muguruza in the Wimbledon final.
She revealed she had hardly thought it possible, when winning the US Open last year, that she would go on to collect the other three in quick succession.
"Man, it is really a great feeling," said Williams, who is now the oldest woman to win a major in the Open era. "I honestly wouldn't have thought last year after winning the US Open I would win the Serena Slam at all. It's super exciting. I just knew I wanted to win Wimbledon this year. Of all the Grand Slams, it was the one I hadn't won in a while.
"Last year I was just so down, because I lost so early in three of the Grand Slams. By the time New York came around, I was like, 'I want to get to the quarter-final of a Grand Slam'. When I won my fourth-round match I was elated."
When she goes back to Flushing Meadows this time round, it will be with the aim of winning a calendar-year Grand Slam. The worrying thing for Muguruza and the others who will be out to stop her is that, at 33, Williams feels fitter than ever.
"I do have some aches and pains, but overall physically I feel like I'm better," she said. "I feel like I'm more fit. I feel like I can do more than 10, 12, whatever years ago. I just keep reinventing myself in terms of working out, in terms of my game. It's been working."
Muguruza, meanwhile, refused to be disheartened with defeat in her first final. "I think I fight all I can fight," she said. "I don't feel disappointment. You never know how many chances you're going to have to play a Grand Slam final, but if you have to choose who to lose [to], I would choose Serena."
After losing in the first round last year, Muguruza has made rapid progress on all surfaces, although she put her Wimbledon improvement down to her approach to this specific tournament. "I came here with another mentality from last year, because I didn't like grass so much before. And this year I came here thinking 'No, I like grass. Seriously Garbine, you like grass'.
"Every day thinking this. It worked."
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